Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9+ are official: Everything you need to know

Following countless leaks that pretty much revealed everything, South Korean tech giant Samsung on Sunday unveiled its flagship Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ smartphones at a press event in Barcelona. This pair will succeed the company’s S8 phones that were released last year and have been quite successful for the company.

According to Samsung, the Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ phones will go on sale beginning March 16, starting $719.99 (INR 46,590) and $839.99 (INR 54,360) respectively. The pre-orders open March 2 in select markets.

Design and display

Considering that the design of the Galaxy S8 phones was stunning and loved by the consumers, Samsung has decided to stick with it in the S9 phones as well, with some tweaks here and there, including a change in the placement of the fingerprint sensor.

Cameras

It is the imaging capabilities where the Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9+ really shine. The S9 model packs a 12MP shooter on the back with f1.5/ f2.4 variable aperture and optical image stabilization (OIS). The presence of f1.5 aperture means, the S9 will be able to capture more light than pretty much every other phone in the world right now. More light will result in cleaner and brighter images in low-light conditions. Additionally, the phone’s camera is capable of shooting super slow-motion videos at an impressive 960fps.

The Galaxy S9+ has all the above features, plus an extra 12MP sensor with telephoto f2.4 lens on the back. On the front, you will get an 8MP f1.7 autofocus selfie camera in both handsets. It is the same front shooter that was present in the Note 8.

Software

Coming to the operating system, Samsung has loaded Android 8.0 Oreo with Samsung Experience 9.0 in the two phones. It is same version of the Samsung UI that has been recently rolled out to Galaxy S8 smartphones. However, there are a couple of surprises. Samsung has included an Apple Animoji like feature called AR Emojis in the S9 phones, which scans your face in 3D and creates animated emoji versions of you.

India release

There is no word on the exact availability details of the S9 and S9+ smartphones in India, but the company has started the pre-bookings for the two phones on the official e-store – Samsung Shop. It is likely that India will get the S9 phones on March 16, like other major markets.